Microsoft Teams is the Office 365 chat-based workspace created to promote easier workplace collaboration, and bringing together people, messaging and content.

As the name suggests, it’s a team-based communication tool, and has been designed for today’s working environment, which can incorporate home and remote working, flexible and shift hours, and involve not only organisations but sometimes teams spread across location, and even time zones.

Running on Windows, Mac, Android, iOS and web platforms, Microsoft describes Teams as “a more open, digital environment that makes work visible, integrated and accessible—across the team—so everyone can stay in the know.”

Communication

Teams supports persistent and threaded conversations.

Messages are posted in real time and the conversations stored – securely and company compliant – to be available for subsequent browse and search. By default, chats are visible to everyone in a team, but private discussions can also be created – and team members can customise messages with individual touches, emojis, stickers, GIFs and memes, etc.

Skype is fully integrated to enable teams to participate in voice and video conferences. Via the Meetings function, organised appointments are listed and the meeting scheduler is simple and easy to use.

Office 365 Productivity

But Teams is not only a messaging forum. It brings together team files, notes, and apps in one place, with Office 365’s Word, Excel, PowerPoint, SharePoint, OneNote, Planner, Power BI and Delve built in to provide a teamwork hub.

James Sperring, Cobweb Development Team Lead, says, “This is a great concept.

“We have been using Teams in our team for the last week and already seen productivity grow.

“We can see it becoming a core part of our workflow, with the ability to bring multiple Office 365 applications together.”

Office 365 Teams plans

Currently available in preview Teams is expected to become generally available in the first quarter of 2017, and for customers with the following plans:

Business Essentials

Business Premium

Enterprise E1, E3 and E5

Visit our Office 365 service page for more information about plan details – or give us a call at the Cobweb team if you’d like further details or to discuss Microsoft Teams and how the new chat workspace could benefit your business.